Former US President Barack Obama and his wife and former First Lady Michelle Obama, were crudely depicted in the video (Picture: Jean Catuffe/GC Images)
Donald Trump has refused to apologise for posting a video depicting Barack and Michelle Obama as apes in one of ‘the most racist things to come from the White House’.
The minute-long video about rigged voting machines, which has since been deleted, showed a two-second shot of the former President and First Lady as apes.
They are dancing in a jungle with The Lion Sleeps Tonight playing in the background.
A White House official said a member of staff ‘erroneously made the post’, but Trump has refused to apologise.
Shirking all responsibility, he said: ‘I looked at it. I didn’t see the whole thing. I gave it to the people, they posted it.
‘What I saw in the beginning was really strong. It was about fraudulent elections. Anytime I see that stuff and it’s credible, you put it up.
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‘I didn’t do it. This was done by someone else. It was a re-truth but that was a very strong truth.’
He added the staffer who posted the video will not be fired.
And when asked if he himself would apologise, Trump said: ‘No, I didn’t make a mistake.’
When a journalist criticized Trump for ‘not knowing what was going on in his name, he lashed out.
He said: ‘I know a hell of a lot better than you do. You don’t know what’s going on. I know what’s going on.’
Senator Tim Scott, who is the only black Republican to have a seat in the senate, described it as ‘the most racist thing I’ve seen out of this White House’.
Senator Tim Scott described it as the ‘most racist thing to come out of the White House’ (Picture: Michael Brochstein/ZUMA Press Wire/Shutterstock)
X user Xerias claimed credit for the Obama video, which the account shared on social media in October.
It mocked many of Trump’s now-familiar string of rivals, including Joe Biden, Kamala Harris and New York City mayor, Zohran Mamdani.
Trump, meanwhile, was depicted as a lion lying on a hammock.
White House spokesperson Karoline Leavitt confirmed to Metro that the clip in Trump’s video yesterday was the one posted by Xerias.
She added: ‘This is from an internet meme video depicting President Trump as the King of the Jungle and Democrats as characters from The Lion King.
‘Please stop the fake outrage and report on something today that actually matters to the American public.’
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